NPR News Now - NPR News: 12-14-2025 5PM EST

Episode Date: December 14, 2025

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Live from NPR News, I'm Janine Hurst. At least 15 people are dead, dozens injured in a mass shooting at a Hanukkah celebration on a beach in Sydney, Australia. In Pierce Tamara Keith reports President Trump praised a man who disarmed one of the gunmen. President Trump said the attack in Australia, non-Jewish families celebrating the first night of Hanukkah, was terrible. And that was an anti-Semitic attack, obviously. And I just want to pay me. their respects to everybody. Trump said the man who was seen on video grabbing a gun from one of the shooters at great risk to himself was a very, very brave person. Trump said he saved a lot of lives. The president was speaking at a holiday reception at the White House and offered an addendum to his

usual Merry Christmas. Today we can very say loudly we celebrate Hanukkah because that was such a horrible attack. That was a purely anti-Semitic attack. Tamara Keith, NPR News, the White House. Authorities in Rhode Island say they've detained a person of interest in a mass shooting at Brown University yesterday. Police say he's a man in his 20s, but they gave no additional information about him. As NPR's Joe Hernandez reports, the attack left at least two people dead, nine others injured. Providence Mayor Brett Smiley announced Sunday morning that a person of interest was in custody.

Smiley said the shooting, which occurred at a Brown University building. where final exams were taking place came as a shock to the city. I think maybe intellectually, we knew it could happen anywhere, including here, but that's not the same as it happening in our community. The Ivy League School canceled exams after the shooting, and authorities said Sunday morning they had lifted the shelter-in-place order for the campus. Joe Hernandez, NPR News. And Rhode Island's governor, Daniel McKee, has ordered flags at state buildings

to be lowered to half-staff. Ukrainian president, Volodemir Zelensky, has signaled that Kiv is willing to give up ambitions to join NATO, head of talks with U.S. envoys and European leaders in Berlin. As Esme Nicholson reports, Zelensky is still refusing, though, to cede eastern Ukraine to Moscow. Responding to reporters via WhatsApp on Sunday, Zelensky acknowledged that Ukraine's NATO membership bid is not supported by all members of the alliance and proposed a number of bilateral Article 5-like security guarantees instead. The compromise comes as talks get underway.

in Berlin to fine-tune the 20-point plan brokered by the US to reach a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine. Eager to make sure European leaders have a seat at the negotiating table as they pledge to keep financing Kiev, German Chancellor Friedrich Meertz is hosting the talks. But Zelensky's first

meetings are bilateral with US President Trump's special envoy Steve Whitkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner who have been leaning on Ukraine to accept painful ceasefire terms. Asmi Nicholson reporting, this is NPR. A study finds that humans are in a golden era of discovery, of the variety of life that exists on Earth. And Pierre's Nate Rot has more.

There are two and a half million unique species on Earth that we humans have discovered and categorized. But that number is constantly growing. A new study published in the journal Science advances looks at the history of species discovery and how it's changing. And it finds that on average, humans are now discovering 17,000 new species every year. Estimates range widely about how much unique life there is on Earth, from the low hundreds of millions of different species to the trillions. The new studies authors say our ability to find new life will only increase with technological advancements like DNA analysis, but for now, they say Earth continues to be a poorly known planet. Nate Rott, NPR News.

At the weekend box office, Zootopia 2 took the top spot with an estimated $26 million in ticket sales. The Walt Disney Company's animated sequel is this year's second film to cross $1 billion worldwide. In second place, five nights at Freddy's 2, with $19 million in its second weekend, that with a domestic total of $95 million, the horror film cost a reported $36 million to produce. In third place, Wicked for Good, with $8 million. And rounding out the top five to Harndar, and Now You See Me, Now You Don't. I'm Janine Herbst, and you're listening to NPR News from Washington.